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2024 Migration Patterns in the US

michaelskis

michaelskis

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In January 2024 Migration Data came out and showed approximately 7.16 million people moved from one U.S. state to another, mostly to the south and to the west.

The "winners" with the most growth were:
RankStateIn-MoversOut-MoversNet Gain
1Texas556,156483,476+72,680
2Florida573,876506,246+67,630
3North Carolina299,782241,195+58,587
4Arizona234,926179,766+55,160
5South Carolina189,333134,657+54,676

While the "losers" with the most loss were:
1California406,873661,205-254,332
2New York285,304415,449-130,145
3Illinois200,326282,796-82,470
4New Jersey150,849214,762-63,913
5Massachusetts152,915182,947-30,032

When you use percentage of population, it shows a slightly list:
RankStatePopulation (1 Yr Ago)Net MigrationNet % Gain
1Vermont633,268+9,137+1.44%
2Nevada3,166,350+41,278+1.30%
3South Carolina5,337,200+54,676+1.02%
4Wyoming575,059+5,301+0.92%
5Oklahoma3,993,874+33,900+0.85%

RankStatePopulation (1 Yr Ago)Net MigrationNet % Loss
1Alaska736,101-10,615-1.44%
2South Dakota915,966-7,299-0.80%
3New Jersey9,374,484-63,913-0.68%
4New York19,626,421-130,145-0.66%
5Illinois12,574,677-82,470-0.66%

I am always thinking along the terms of why these patterns exist, especially when you see states like South Carolina in both gain number and percentage list and places like New York and Illinois on the both the loss number and percentage lists. Is it the climate, cost of living, politics, or something else. I am thinking in the context of population being a finite and dwindling resource in the future. We already have a birth rate lower than the replacement threshold and if immigration policies continue to tighten up, we will see a net decrease in population at some point in the next couple censuses.

What are your thoughts on why people move. Personally, we left Michigan and moved to the south because of the weather and opportunities.
 
Depends on where you are.

Michigan I'm moving because I hate the cold.
Kansas, well because it's Kansas.
Arizona people leave because they hate the hot.
We get a lot of California and they say it's politics, but when you talk to them it's cost of living.
Jobs of course are a big thing. I know we are increasing job opportunities.
Also, I know a lot of people claim to move to Arizona because of the weather, but I feel like the job opportunities was part of it.
 
I just came back from spending school vacation week in Florida. To me, the (ostensible) benefits of the Sun Belt are rather obvious in a world where air conditioning is ubiquitous. We're in the midst of a brutal winter here in the north - six months of winter starts to feel like living on a spaceship or in a submarine. It feels like you're missing out on life, inside in front of screens or curled up with books trying to make the best of it. The place comes alive May through October but then you're back to being a shut in for another six months. For all the talk of grit and hardiness, most folks are just in front of the teevee or in their cars with the heat on blast running errands.

Meanwhile, there's growth, amenities, and dynamism in the Sun Belt. Less provincialism because there are so many transplants. Southern hospitality abounds. You go out on a Thursday night in February and there's live music, beers on tap, and a volleyball game going on in the town green. It all sort of sells itself if you can overlook the toxic state politics. I get that July and August are sort of like the south's 'winter', as it were, but the sun is still shining and there's opportunity.
 
Meh. IL's stat is a whooping 0.0065 reduction.

A rounding error's rounding error's rounding error.

(aka 82,740/12,700,000)
 
MacheteJames said:
I just came back from spending school vacation week in Florida. To me, the (ostensible) benefits of the Sun Belt are rather obvious in a world where air conditioning is ubiquitous. We're in the midst of a brutal winter here in the north - six months of winter starts to feel like living on a spaceship or in a submarine. It feels like you're missing out on life, inside in front of screens or curled up with books trying to make the best of it. The place comes alive May through October but then you're back to being a shut in for another six months. For all the talk of grit and hardiness, most folks are just in front of the teevee or in their cars with the heat on blast running errands.

Meanwhile, there's growth, amenities, and dynamism in the Sun Belt. Less provincialism because there are so many transplants. Southern hospitality abounds. You go out on a Thursday night in February and there's live music, beers on tap, and a volleyball game going on in the town green. It all sort of sells itself if you can overlook the toxic state politics. I get that July and August are sort of like the south's 'winter', as it were, but the sun is still shining and there's opportunity.
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Having lived in fast growing areas of the south my entire life, it fits with what I've heard. Most of AL's in-migration comes from GA, FL, and TN. While all similar in the big picture, we have lower taxes, cheaper land, and lots of expanding industry. We hear from people leaving metro ATL and Nashville almost daily because of work options and lower cost of living. We also see a lot of people moving regionally from Columbus, GA, Montgomery, and other large cities in AL because of quality of life and schools.

Industry and jobs are moving here because we incentivize and rebate the hell out of them. Plus again we have cheap land, cheap taxes, acceptable QofL, meager regulations, and cheap labor. Almost every company asks about union presence of which there is almost none. Lots of people follow the jobs.

A few things have been interesting to me in the last couple of years. We're catching a significant number of people leaving Florida and what I hear is because of cost of living and insurance. The second is that it feels like more young unmarried women and highly educated people are moving elsewhere. While observational, I know a few professors, drs, and professionals that have moved in the last 2-3 years because they don't feel welcome anymore.
 
bureaucrat#3 said:
The second is that it feels like more young unmarried women and highly educated people are moving elsewhere.
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I think this is another important element. Marriage rates continue to drop, having children continues to drop, and vasectomies for college aged men continues to increase.

The housing stock of the past 40 years isn’t going to work for most of the population of the future.
 
I find this interesting given the discussions:


Last week Starbucks also announced that whey would be opening a second HQ in Nashville. In TN, the tax structure is very different than WA for corporate taxes and TN has no State Income Tax. Now Schultz might just be moving because he wants to be able to see the sun again, but I think there is more to it.
 
VT was basically a Covid bump and people who owned ski condos staying in them instead of their place in Boston or NYC. Lost 1,200 in 2025, supposedly. (we'll see in a year when the real 2025 numbers come out).

Everything @MacheteJames said about Florida and the South in general rings true. Winter especially is tough in northern NE, and people who dominate the politics and decision-making here seem to like it that way, ignoring that "it would be nice to have some things to do in the winter sometimes." It's not just the temperature. Friends near us with strong Michigan ties marvel at all the stuff there is to do in winter when they go back and visit.

Here? Skiing is getting out-of-reach expensive. Our population is aging. Our budget to plow roads is shrinking and the silly "safe roads at safe speeds" state policy is just putting lipstick on the pig- we can't afford to maintain our roads. You have to own two sets of tires and a place to store one of them. It's hard to get around and frankly if you're not exactly the right flavor of lefty its hard to make and keep social connections going in our more populated counties. Covid restrictions were taken to an extreme and those who seemed to like wearing masks pushed for their extension long past when they were really needed. Housing is prohibitively expensive after 50 years of "drawbridge mentality" zoning papered over with a thin veneer of environmentalism. School taxes are obscene, eating up all of our (very high) property tax, some of our sales tax, and a chunk of our gas tax that should be funding road maintenance- but doesn't so your car repair bills are higher, too. There are 20,000 fewer school age kids (in a state if 650k) than there were 30 years ago. There is no dynamism- there's depression.

I live and work in the state I grew up in- I truly love this place. But I have to separate my nostalgia for what it was for what it is today and what it is becoming.
 
@Faust_Motel

It's hard for me to fully grasp VT's low population density for a New England state.

RI is approx. 1/9th VT's land area but nearly 2x the population and RI doesn't feel 'crowded' when I've driven through even coastal RI.

I mean I could use a rural northern lower MI county as an analog. Montmorency County MI (just west of the MI county I grewup in) has a normal 'Ord of 1787' land area but only 9,153 population.

It's a whole lot of 'nowhere'.
 
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mendelman said:
@Faust_Motel

It's hard for me to fully grasp VT's low population density for a New England state.

RI is approx. 1/9th VT's land area but nearly 2x the population and RI doesn't feel 'crowded' when I've driven through even coastal RI.

I mean could use a rural northern lower MI county as an analog. Montmorency County MI (just west of the MI county I grewup in) has a normal 'Ord of 1787' size but only 9,153 population.

It's a whole lot of 'nowhere'.
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Arizona is super empty for a state with so many people. We just put all the people in one place. Being a bigger state and mostly desert helps too.
 
DVD said:
Arizona is super empty for a state with so many people. We just put all the people in one place. Being a bigger state and mostly desert helps too.
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Truth. But that's why I made the 'New England state' distinction.

Montana's basically one dude and a bunch of cattle, but there's distinct historical difference between VT and MT.
 
mendelman said:
@Faust_Motel

It's hard for me to fully grasp VT's low population density for a New England state.

RI is approx. 1/9th VT's land area but nearly 2x the population and RI doesn't feel 'crowded' when I've driven through even coastal RI.

I mean could use a rural northern lower MI county as an analog. Montmorency County MI (just west of the MI county I grewup in) has a normal 'Ord of 1787' size but only 9,153 population.

It's a whole lot of 'nowhere'.
Click to expand...
It feels suburban where I live but it gets really rural really fast when you head out of town.

You can start a bike ride from Burlington and be in "dog on a chain outside a falling down singlewide trailer" territory in about 45 minutes.
 
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